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If it’s May at the Western Don Wright music faculty, that must be the Canadian Operatic Arts Academy (COAA) you’re hearing.

“We try to bring, as always, people from all over the place,” COAA general director and Wright faculty Prof. Sophie Roland said during this week’s Reaney’s Pick video shoot at the school. Young singers were preparing for collaborations with Orchestra London this month. The first is an Italian-themed program presented Friday at Chatham and Saturday at Centennial Hall.

“We’re really building, with Orchestra London, a community partnership,” Roland said Tuesday.

Dozens of singers, some from South America, and about half a dozen directors and six collaborative pianists study at COAA. In Tuesday’s video, four Western singers — mezzo Madison Arsenault, tenor Scott Rumble and sopranos Katherine Richard and Anna Moreau — are seen rehearsing a selection from Mozart’s Idomeneo. It’s to be heard on May 25 when the orchestra joins the singers on campus at the Paul Davenport Theatre in Talbot College.

Woodstock CI secondary-school grad Rumble and Keswick’s Arsenault are among the singers at this weekend’s concerts.

“For some singers, this will be their first experience outside of their home country,” Roland said in statement. “It becomes a fantastic experience for all.”

This weekend’s concerts offer selections from such Italian operas as Puccini’s Madama Butterfly and La boheme, Verdi’s Aida, La traviata and Falstaff and Rossini’s La gazza ladra. Also on the program is Canadian composer John Estacio’s Bootlegger’s Tarantella from Filumena.

Simone Luti, from Milan, and JoAnn Kulesza, from the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, are COAA’s two musical directors. Timothy Nelson, an American from the Opera Studio Nederland, is also an artistic director. Other faculty include Americans Martin Katz and Andrew Altenbach; Montrealer Chantal Lambert; British conductor Oliver Gooch and American Gary Wedow; as well as Western’s own teachers.

Luti and Nelson were joined by Western grad student Debbie Grigg, the collaborative pianist, alongside the singers during the video shoot.

Luti and Kulesza helm free concerts by COAA singers in staged scenes and arias from operas at the Paul Davenport Theatre on May 24 (7:30 p.m.) and May 26 (2 p.m.).

Meanwhile, Orchestra London also has its Mother’s Day brunch concert on Sunday at noon at the Best Western Plus Lamplighter Inn and Conference Centre.

Brunch is followed by Orchestra London violinists Henry Krichker and Emilie Pare, violist Kelvin Enns and cellist Lac-Hong Phi. The program ranges from Mozart’s Allegro from Divertimento No.1 to such contemporary hits as Adele’s Rolling in the Deep and Metallica’s Nothing Else Matters and classics such as Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah and the Beatles’ Eleanor Rigby.

Details: Visit CKtickets.com or call 519-354-8338 or 1-866-807-7770 for Chatham concert. Visit orchestralondon.ca or call 519-679-8778 for Centennial Hall and Serenade Brunch tickets. Tickets also available at door.

Canadian Operatic Arts Academy: Program at Western’s Don Wright music faculty in May, with an Italian base (AEDO) later in the summer, COAA is an elite international program. It provides singers, pianists and directors with the skills to sustain a professional opera career. Topics include role preparation, performance practice, collaboration, dramatic exercises and study, audition training, promotion, management and vocal health. The program includes performances, with 2013 participants working with Orchestra London in a continuing partnership. Visit www.music.uwo.ca or call 519-661-3767 for information about May 24-26 concerts.